


Than The Sun

by Seikilos



Category: Bleach
Genre: M/M, Music, Pining, Post-Canon, Secret santa Lets Go!!!, Yearning, lots of pining, this fic is all vibes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:07:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28321371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seikilos/pseuds/Seikilos
Summary: “I’ve been waiting for you for like, a whole fuckin’ year.”“Me too.”
Relationships: Grimmjow Jaegerjaques/Kurosaki Ichigo
Comments: 9
Kudos: 138





	Than The Sun

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gizah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gizah/gifts).



> Hi Gizah I'm your secret santa gifter-er... whatever! Anyway this comes with a song that I wrote. I'll link it here:
> 
> [Song Link](https://soundcloud.com/kaseyapollo/than-the-sun)

_‘How long has it been?’_

This thought had crossed Ichigo’s mind endlessly over the past couple of months. After the war it felt like things were finally settling down; something Ichigo had subconsciously been praying for. As the novelty of serenity wore down, Ichigo was left restless. Sleep wouldn’t come easy and insomnia caressed its ugly hands around him. He didn’t exert nearly a tenth of the energy he had used in his substitute shinigami days and he could feel his body withering down. 

What was he supposed to do, honestly? Take down random low-tier hollows that entered Karakura town? Things like that took seconds if they weren’t _actually_ afraid of Ichigo. Not to mention the thought of hollows led a mental line right to arrancar.

And when Ichigo thought of Arrancar, he thought of _Grimmjow_. 

He wasn’t sure how it happened or when it happened but Grimmjow had consumed much of Ichigo’s thoughts. It was a strange thing, Ichigo wondered at first. He attributed it to the fact he was bored and Grimmjow always livened up the place. Slowly, these thoughts turned from wanting to get his muscles moving again, to just craving to see his face. Ichigo tried to leave these thoughts to the side, letting them hopefully turn to dust as they rot. However, the stench of them became worse and some days it was all he’d think of.

He’d see someone on the street with hair dyed stark blue and he would think _‘Grimmjow would be so offended -- it’s so patchy’_ or one of his friends would smirk in a way that just _slightly_ reminded him of the shit-eating grin that Grimmjow always wore. His heart would grow a little heavy and the weights would be filled with some sort of yearning.

A month or so later, the thoughts became exhausting. He had friends -- sure -- but who he smoothly talk to about such a thing. Orihime and him had gotten much closer, but she might overthink the whole situation. He’d have to wait to see Rukia. Ishida would think about it too logically, which would be exactly what Ichigo would want if he didn’t need time to just _talk_ . Ichigo just needed to _talk_. Endlessly until the thoughts finally formed themselves into a nice little box and he could understand what he was feeling.

That left Chad.

Quiet, reserved, and so caring and careful. Chad might not give a response but he would _listen_.

“Chad, do you have a minute?” Ichigo acted flippant. He didn’t want Chad to worry beforehand.

“Hm?” Chad hummed before nodding. He had something in his hands. Was he knitting? Maybe he was as bored of life as Ichigo was. He’d ask him about it later.

“I need help sorting out my thoughts.”

Chad looked awkward. “Ah.” Ichigo understood this. Chad probably wasn’t very good at helping with something like this and Ichigo wanted to curse himself for not thinking of this. 

“I’ll do most of the talking, Chad. I just need to hear myself say it.”

“Alright. I’ll try to help.” He set down what he was knitting. Was it a scarf? The woven threads were perfectly stitched in such a way that Ichigo couldn’t help but be impressed. Maybe he’d ask him to knit him something one day. 

Ichigo was stalling.

He knew this.

He could feel it deep in his bones, in the twitching muscles that just wanted to move to get out of the awkward and heavy air.

He had to speak.

“I’ve been bored. Really bored.” He started. “I thought maybe working out or helping with hollows would help, but no dice. Because of that, my brain has been wandering a lot.” He rubbed the back of his head, letting out a breathy laugh.

Chad didn’t react, but Ichigo knew he was listening so he kept going.

“So when I see hollows I just -- think of Grimmjow. You remember the blue haired arrancar that kicked my ass? And then I kicked his ass --sorta? Him. I didn’t think much about him but when I saw him again during the Yhwach situation. Since then he’s sort of been all on my mind. At first it was just -- damn I wanted to fight him again.” Ichigo tried to reign in his thoughts. Chad knew who Grimmjow was. He just had to keep talking. “We never got that rematch. Not only that, I haven’t really seen him since the war.”

Chad shifted his sitting position and Ichigo wondered if he was about to speak, but after a couple seconds of silence, it was clear he was waiting expectantly. 

So Ichigo kept spewing out nonsense. “I don’t know what has happened since then, but now he’s all I want to see. I see things and I’m reminded of him. I hear people talk and sometimes I think ‘man, a little deeper and that might just sound like Grimmjow.’” Ichigo laughed to himself. “Isn’t that messed up?”

With no response, he continued. “So I tried to just -- forget about him. That’s easy enough. I mean, he’s just an asshole arrancar who tried to fight me to the death. But…” This is where Ichigo always got stuck. There was something like a brick wall when he reached this point in his thought processes. He couldn’t explain what it was about Grimmjow that kept him on his mind. But he had to roll out any words. At this point, he knew that it didn’t matter if it made sense or not. He just had to get something out. “But it made me feel alive.” With the tone moving upward, it sounded like a question. Was it a question though? What was Ichigo questioning? There was nothing to question there. Those were the right words. That was the right feeling.

Grimmjow made him feel alive.

“I want to feel that again. Feel alive. I want to see him again. His stupid grin. His stupid blue hair. I want to fight him. I want to hear him talk. I wanna hear him laugh at me while we fight.” Where did he go from here? Was there more to say? There was. The feelings pulled from him like a thread, unravelling his whole person and suddenly he started to understand what all these feelings were made of. “After, I want to talk to him -- as a person -- and a friend. I want to hear those laughs and see that dumbass smirk when I’m making a stupid joke. I want to sit next to him and just -- talk about whatever is on our mind. I want to show him all the cool human stuff that’s here. Things like that…”

That’s what this was.

There was more.

He felt his face growing warm and he wasn’t sure if it was from talking too much or if his body caught up to what he finally was beginning to comprehend.

“And then after that, I want to be able to fight him for fun. And afterward we can -- I don’t know -- grab a bite to eat. Show him all our favorite hangout places. Just the two of us. I want to hold his hand and…” It was getting to be too much for him. “Shit…”

Chad finally reacted with a smile. He could read Ichigo like a book. 

Ichigo covered his face in embarrassment. “I think I get it.”

“Oh? And?”

“I’m in love with Grimmjow. That’s so dumb. I’m so dumb.” Ichigo rubbed his face violently, as if trying to wipe away the feelings from his face. It wouldn’t work. They’ve been there for a while and wouldn’t leave anytime soon. “I hate this. I don’t even know how to find him or talk to him or anything.”

Chad stood next to Ichigo now and draped his arm around Ichigo’s shoulders as some sort of gesture of solace. “Have you talked to Rukia about seeing him? Or Urahara?” 

“No.” Of course he didn’t. He’d never thought of it. Imagine if he just went up to one of them and asked to see the arrancar that tried to kill him. They would call him crazy. 

Maybe he was a little crazy. “Maybe I should.”

Chad hummed in agreement.

It took Ichigo days to finally contact Urahara. It’s not that he couldn’t get to him, it’s just that Ichigo kept doubting himself. He’d look at the number on his phone and pause. His nerves would get to him and he would give up. 

One of the days he was about to call; Urahara called him instead. “Hey! Kurosaki! How’s it going?” Urahara’s excited voice was -- well -- even more intense than usual. “How’d you like to come over today?”

That was never a good sign. Ichigo’s friends would all hang out at Urahara’s shop since it was a nice, quiet place to chill at. But when Urahara specifically calls on someone, it’s going to get weird. Ichigo hesitated. “... Why?”

“You’ll see when you get here! I might have made something _really_ cool. I’ve been working on it secretly for a couple months and now I’m ready to showcase it to you.”

“Why me, specifically?”

“You’ll find out.”

“Urahara.”

“See you in an hour!” He hung up.

Ichigo groaned. Why was Urahara always like this? Would he even have a moment to talk to Urahara about contacting arrancar? Where would they even find him anyway? Urahara _might_ know but…

Screw it, Ichigo was already dressed and going toward his shop.

Walking into Urahara’s was odd. The silence was almost overwhelming and the looming ‘surprise’ that Urahara had for him worried him even more. With a deep sigh, Ichigo called out. “Uraha--”

A door slammed open in front of Ichigo. “There you are! Come on in!”

The sound and Urahara’s burst into Ichigo’s fast scared him. “You --!” Ichigo growled. “You scared the hell out of me!”

“Ah you’ve fought scarier than me you’ll be fine.” Urahara waved it off in his typical nonchalant demeanor and led him through the shop, talking as he walked. “So I’ve been in contact with the soul society and whatnot and we’ve been working on a few things to gently help some of them join our world.” He was almost singing. “Obviously, there’s gigai. But those are so specific and have their own messy problems so I’ve been trying to perfect it. I looked at you for inspiration.”

“Me?”

“You have a real body. And a real soul. And you can just pop right out of one to the other.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s because --”

“SO!” Urahara interrupted. “I decided to try to build a gigai-like invention that was similar to that. It could grow old with the soul! Isn’t that awesome? But of course, I needed someone to practice it on…” He opened the hatch to his hidden training grounds. “Come on let’s go.”

“I don’t like where this is going.”

“Oh, you _will_.” The way Urahara said it sounded vaguely like a threat. It probably was, knowing him. Ichigo felt a looming sense of dread fill his veins. This was not going to be fun.

“When they got into the training grounds, Urahara gasped. “Hey, where’s the test subject?”

“I swear to fuck if you call me that one more time, I’m going to tear you in half.” The voice growled. It was low and angry and all too easy to recognize for Ichigo.

That was Grimmjow’s voice.

“Grimmjow?” Ichigo accidentally squeaked out. He felt his face grow hot again. He didn’t want to sound desperate but apparently his yearning heart had more control than his head did.

“Oh you’ve gotta be fuckin’ with me.” Behind a rock appeared stark, cyan blue hair whisked back elegantly. Captivating blue eyes that had a fire fueled by aggression and a love of violence. The smirk on his face was one of pure excitement. “It’s you, Kurosaki!”

The first thing Ichigo noticed was the clothes. They weren’t the same clothes that he normally wore as an Arrancar. It was a sleeveless shirt with some punk band Ichigo had never heard of and fashionably ripped up jeans. His hands stuffed into his pockets he sauntered over to Ichigo. He wasn’t much more than a few centimeters taller, with the strange blue makeup still on his face but there was something… different about him. Minus his clothes.

He was just a foot away from Ichigo, far too close for comfort. “How’ve ya been, shithole?”

Why did Ichigo miss this so much? “Well. How about you, fucker?” It felt freeing to say rude things sometimes. It let all the anger and frustrations go for just a moment. 

“Oh, you know, being used as a lab mouse by your mad scientist friend over here.”

“Did you get forced to?” Ichigo laughed. “Doesn’t sound like you.”

“Nah, I offered to do it. I was so bored after the Yhwach bullshit.”

“So was I.”

They smiled at each other, their eyes glued onto one another. He wasn’t sure what it was, but Ichigo felt like there was some sort of softness to the flare in Grimmjow’s eyes. Maybe it was just rose-colored lenses, but he was hoping it could have been something more.

“Well… you could have come visit me. We could have fought. We could settle that score we’ve been sitting on for ages.” 

“Didn’t know how.”

“Didja think to fuckin’ ask?” Grimmjow knew the answer to that, Ichigo thought. He was just teasing him.

“We could settle it soon,” Ichigo turned to Urahara. “What did you want to --?” Urahara was gone. The wires connected themselves in Ichigo’s brain and he understood. 

Was this Grimmjow’s Gigai?

“Figured it out?” Grimmjow’s smile had widened further, a full toothy smirk. “Check this out.” Grimmjow lifted his shirt to show a well toned body -- and no hollow hole. “I look totally human. Disgustin’ right?!”

Ichigo silently thanked whatever god was watching for giving him the opportunity to see Girmmjow brag about having a full body. “Looks… good.”

“Don’t let it distract you when we fight.”

“I wouldn’t -- Wait you’re going to fight in that body?!” It was way too human, Ichigo wondered. He sure as hell wouldn’t fight in his human body.

“Nah, I’ll step out of it, dumbass. Like you do. C’mon, let’s fight.” Grimmjow was eager. He shoved Ichigo back a few paces. “I’ve been waiting for you for like, a whole fuckin’ year.”

“Me too.”

He didn’t mean to whisper those words and when he said them it hit him like a train. He really hated himself at this moment. 

Grimmjow’s face was unreadable. His eyes were wide and his mouth lost it’s iconic sneer. He looked like he was trying to find the words to say, his mouth opening every couple of seconds. His cheeks were colored pink. “You…”

“Forget I said anything!” Ichigo exclaimed. 

“Fuck you! You missed me!”

“You missed me too!”

“Only ‘cause you piss me off so fuckin much!”

“Your face says otherwise!” 

“Your face ain’t lookin’ much better, fuckhead! Anyway I’m getting out of this body fuck you!” He pressed something on his wrist and after a couple of seconds the gigai began slipping off, leaving the Grimmjow Ichigo recognized. Sword already in his hand. “Hurry the hell up!” He was still blushing a little.

It took a few seconds for Ichigo to get out of his body. The lurching sensation always made his stomach stir. Even though he had done it so much.

The two stood there, swords drawn. Wondering who would make the first move. This wasn’t entirely what Ichigo had in mind, but it was definitely one of the many things he wanted to do with Grimmjow.

He remembered Grimmjow’s reaction to Ichigo saying he missed him. What was that? Did he feel the same way? Was he just as confused as Ichigo was? He wanted to ask a thousand questions. He wasn’t sure if he’d have time, though.

The fight lasted forever. The first few minutes were spent with each of them trying to get used to their soul-bodies. The muscles felt petrified, as if small rocks had found home inside each crevice of their joints. Before finally, it felt comfortable. They started fighting at full speed.

After that, time had lost all meaning. Ichigo wanted to prove he was the better fighter, but Grimmjow had no intention of giving up either. Between fighting as hard as they could, Ichigo found himself screaming terrible things at Grimmjow, and Grimmjow reciprocating. 

“Fuck you for being gone for so long! My body feels like it got weak!”

“It feels weaker. I’m hardly workin’ a sweat. Should’ve called me sooner.”

So on and so forth. 

Maybe, in a way, it was them admitting their feelings for each other. Ichigo wasn’t sure. But it felt like it. They aired out their grievances on the field where they spilled blood and spit everywhere. Ichigo also felt as if neither of them wanted the fight to end. If it did, would they stop seeing each other?

Ichigo didn’t want that.

So he fought. As hard as he could. Fought to keep Grimmjow in his sights. Fought to keep the thought that, maybe, there doesn’t need to be a winner. If there wasn’t a winner, then Grimmjow would keep coming back, right? That’s what Ichigo wanted.

His body gave up before his mind did. After one rough swing, both their swords clashed. There was no strength left though, and through gritting teeth Ichigo and Grimmjow stared at each other. 

“You ready to give up, Kurosaki?” Grimmjow’s voice was all breath. There was no energy left in his typical growl.

“Only if you are.” The two smirked at each other.

“I’m not letting go.”

“Neither am I.”

“Cause if I lose, I gotta keep comin’ back to you.” Grimmjow reasoned. “Cause I ain’t gonna lose to you.”

“And if you win?”

“Then you’ll keep comin’ back to me, right?” There was something in Grimmjow’s voice. It felt -- sad. As if he was begging for Ichigo to come back.

“I mean, you could just stay with me forever. We could fight whenever you wanted… And we could see each other all the time.” Ichigo didn’t know what he was saying, but he couldn’t stop himself. It was like with Chad, he was done thinking. He just had to speak. “With your new Gigai it’d be easy.”

He felt Grimmjow’s stance falter just slightly. He stared in surprise. Ichigo thought he could win in this moment, just one decent push and he’s got Grimmjow down. But he couldn’t move. He wanted to hear what Grimmjow would say back.

“I think I’d like that.”

Something burned in Ichigo’s heart then and it burned hotter when he saw the smile on Grimmjow’s face. It wasn’t the same as before. It was gentle and kind. In a way, it shined brighter than the sun. Ichigo had to look away.

“Promise?”

“Shit, Kurosaki.” Grimmjow rolled his eyes. “I guess I promise.”

And Ichigo took that opportunity to push Grimmjow’s sword. His stance fell and both of them realized they had become statues and the moment they moved, they’d fall. And so Ichigo fell beside Grimmjow. 

Both of them were heaving, trying to find the breath that they no longer had. Grimmjow was the first to speak. “I didn’t fuckin lose, by the way.”

“You fell first.” 

“You fell right after, fuckface.”

Were they talking about the fight? Or was Grimmjow mentioning something else? Ichigo laughed to himself. He felt like some sort of poet, trying to find deep meaning in everything. He finally sighed. “Let’s call it a draw then.”

“Then we’ll have to fight again.” Grimmjow had a smug look on his face. “I like the sound of that.”

It was quiet then. Ichigo didn’t know what to say and he felt as if Grimmjow felt the same way. He finally turned toward Grimmjow, his body sore and bloodied. “Grimmjow?”

“Hm?”

“I was serious about what I said.”

“So was I.”

Ichigo didn’t expect that. “Did you miss me?”

“Someone had to.” The sarcastic response didn’t match his eyes which said ‘yes.’

“Why?”

“Shit, Kurosaki. I don’t fuckin’ know. Why did you miss me?”

“... I don’t know.”

“Then who gives a shit. For some fuckin’ reason we can’t forget about each other. Ain’t that fuckin’ cute or whatever?”

“Is it really that cute when we’re covered in blood?”

“Looks good on you.”

Ichigo blushed. “Right…”

“I’ve watched enough of your human movies.” Ichigo wanted to laugh at Grimmjow calling them ‘human’ movies. Were there arrancar movies? “This is the part where you admit you love me or some shit.”

“I’m not saying that.”

Grimmjow rolled his eyes, clearly enjoying this. “Tch, ruining the narrative, huh?”

“I haven’t seen you in a year, what kind of narrative are you expecting?”

“Dunno.” 

It went quiet then. After a few seconds, Ichigo felt something warm touch his hand. He thought it was blood until he glanced down and was shocked at what he saw.

Grimmjow had entangled their fingers together. His thumb rubbing against Ichigo’s.

“Got a problem with it?” Grimmjow looked at Ichigo.

Ichigo smiled. “Nah.”

“Good, cause I ain’t got the strength to do much else. Fuck. It’s gonna take me days to recover.”

“That’s your fault.”

“Fuck you, its your fault too.”

Ichigo chuckled and Grimmjow joined in. 

Everything felt good. Right now, side by side, completely drained of energy with Grimmjow.

Ichigo liked that. 


End file.
